How come Americans are so bad at spelling and grammar?

Oh, well.

Meantime, I send a hand to Neo, I read you, neo, but don't routinely comment.

You're trying to make me make buritos again. You are just bad.

Just pulling your leg, osso; having spied it below your Freudian slip.

There will be no leg pulling here while I'm around. It starts out as just fun and games and ends up with someone's limbs out of joint. Shame on you!

I don't get it -I admit to being stupid.
That's my way.

No offense intended but that's because they are above you, Ed. I've seen many like you, their eyes quickly glaze over in discussion about language.

Glazed they are.

I guess eye gouging's out, too, huh? What about nitpicking?

I knew that from previous discussions that we have had. That's why consciously knowing grammar isn't at all important to functioning in language. You had all the grammar you needed at age five and you've been doing fine ever since.

True. If I knew what I don't know about language, it likely would have little to no impact on how I write and speak.

It would have the same impact on how you breath if you knew all about the physiological aspects of breathing.

Or it would have the same impact on how you walk if you knew all about the physiological aspects of walking.

I don't think so.

It's well known that deep breathing improves the way you oxygenate your blood, thus ameliorating any physiological process.

Same with walking, if you know the physiological aspects of it, you can probably try to walk with elegance and style and adopt ways that are beneficial to your body..

And we see folks doing that all the time.



See what I mean.

I was talking about physiological processes compared to the intellectual process of language.

They are different..

What's you reference for the 90% figure?

I don't think that reading extensively and broadly teaches s child how to spell and use good grammar. Recent studies in childhood education have now indicated that children who grow up in homes, where the parents are educated and use a fairly extensive vocabulary, will have significantly higher IQ values than children who do not have this exposure to a rich and extenisve vocabulary.

Thus the correlation is between IQ and vocabulary. The source of this vocabulary would appear to be from the parents.


But these parents are ones who can afford to spend time with their kids, reading to them, listening to them, taking them to museums or concerts.
If a child comes from a single, or even two parent, middle or lower middle class family, the parent(s) will hardly have the time to spend enough time with his/her child due to so many other obligations such are work, home duties, striving to balance a budget, with intense income restrictions.

The only hope for the child reared in this type of environment to build a rich vocabulary, extensive reading list, and higher IQ value. is the public library.

The grammar kids learn is learned in their homes, or if they have little home life, out on the streets. Kids can't learn an enriched vocabulary by listening to Rap or by texting night and day.

I urge children to read...and read more. But the reading and the material read must be interesting and enjoyable to the child.

Some of my fondest memories of growing up on the SouthSide of Chicago were spent reading in the Hyde Park and Woodlawn libraries. I'll never forget the little yellow cards that were placed in the books for checkouts and the newly bound and freshly printed books with their delious odors.

I only hope that kids growing up today in Chicago still have the opportunities, that good libraries provide to all children, rich and poor.


As far as spelling is concerned, I know many well -educated individuals who are not great spellers. I also know many well educated folks who don't use perfect grammar. It should be noted that many of the exams that are used for admission to various professional programs ( medicine, law, management, dentistry, pharmacy, etc.) are multiple choice, so that it doesn't matter if the candidate taking the exam can spell or use correct grammar.

What "intellectual process of language" would that be, Timur?

That's probably stretching the study, Miller.



Having a higher IQ doesn't translate into having better grammar. There have been some pretty high IQ people who were grammar dunces, in the sense of consciously knowing grammar. News media have these kinds of people all the time - think William Safire. Educational institutions also have these grammar dunces - think Strunk and White, ... .

Also known as Language development.

As you often noted, kids can master the rules of speech without having been taught grammar.

Precisely. And knowing the rules of grammar would make no difference to their language abilities just as knowing the physiology of breathing would make no difference to one's ability to breathe.